The corona crisis brings airlines billions in losses. Lufthansa has been relying on state aid for some time.
Frankfurt / Main (dpa) - Lufthansa can no longer save itself from the corona crisis on its own. The Dax group released this assessment after reporting an operating loss of EUR 1.2 billion for the first quarter.
The company announced in Frankfurt that a significantly higher minus is expected for the current second quarter. It is currently not foreseeable when the flight operations can be expanded again.
Lufthansa currently has a total of 4.4 billion euros in liquid funds after renewed borrowing, which will, however, decrease significantly in the "next weeks", it said. "The group does not expect to be able to cover the emerging capital requirement with further borrowings on the market."
According to the information, Lufthansa is therefore "in intensive negotiations" with the governments of the airline's home countries Germany, Switzerland, Austria and Belgium. There are various financing instruments to maintain solvency in the short term. In addition to guarantees, loans and silent participations, direct state participations are also being discussed. The talks continued. The Lufthansa Executive Board was confident that it could be successfully concluded.
Europe's largest aviation group lost almost 1.4 billion euros in sales in March alone, it said in a mandatory announcement to the stock exchange. In the entire quarter, sales of EUR 6.4 billion were thus of a similar magnitude below the previous year's figure of EUR 7.8 billion.
The company put the operating loss (adjusted EBIT) at 1.2 billion euros. In the previous year, the loss in the traditionally weak quarter at the beginning of the year was 336 million euros. In addition, unfavorable fuel contracts and impairments of the aircraft will now put pressure on profits. Lufthansa plans to publish details in mid-May.
Ryanair boss Michael O'Leary accused Lufthansa of abusing the corona crisis. "I think that airlines like Lufthansa and Air France are using the Covid crisis to enrich themselves with unbelievably high sums from the state," said the always opinionated airline manager to the "Handelsblatt" (Friday). O'Leary excluded state aid for his own company because he had sufficient cash reserves. Ryanair will likely survive significantly longer than any other airline, he claimed.
